Fill database tables with a large amount of test data

I need to load a table with a large amount of test data. This is to be used for testing performance and scaling.

How can I easily create 100,000 rows of random/junk data for my database table?

Solution 1:

You could also use a stored procedure. Consider the following table as an example:

CREATE TABLE your_table (id int NOT NULL PRIMARY KEY AUTO_INCREMENT, val int);

Then you could add a stored procedure like this:

DELIMITER $$
CREATE PROCEDURE prepare_data()
BEGIN
  DECLARE i INT DEFAULT 100;

  WHILE i < 100000 DO
    INSERT INTO your_table (val) VALUES (i);
    SET i = i + 1;
  END WHILE;
END$$
DELIMITER ;

When you call it, you'll have 100k records:

CALL prepare_data();

Solution 2:

For multiple row cloning (data duplication) you could use

DELIMITER $$
CREATE PROCEDURE insert_test_data()
BEGIN
  DECLARE i INT DEFAULT 1;

  WHILE i < 100000 DO
    INSERT INTO `table` (`user_id`, `page_id`, `name`, `description`, `created`)
    SELECT `user_id`, `page_id`, `name`, `description`, `created`
    FROM `table`
    WHERE id = 1;
    SET i = i + 1;
  END WHILE;
END$$
DELIMITER ;
CALL insert_test_data();
DROP PROCEDURE insert_test_data;

Solution 3:

Here it's solution with pure math and sql:

create table t1(x int primary key auto_increment);
insert into t1 () values (),(),();

mysql> insert into t1 (x) select x + (select count(*) from t1) from t1;
Query OK, 1265 rows affected (0.01 sec)
Records: 1265  Duplicates: 0  Warnings: 0

mysql> insert into t1 (x) select x + (select count(*) from t1) from t1;
Query OK, 2530 rows affected (0.02 sec)
Records: 2530  Duplicates: 0  Warnings: 0

mysql> insert into t1 (x) select x + (select count(*) from t1) from t1;
Query OK, 5060 rows affected (0.03 sec)
Records: 5060  Duplicates: 0  Warnings: 0

mysql> insert into t1 (x) select x + (select count(*) from t1) from t1;
Query OK, 10120 rows affected (0.05 sec)
Records: 10120  Duplicates: 0  Warnings: 0

mysql> insert into t1 (x) select x + (select count(*) from t1) from t1;
Query OK, 20240 rows affected (0.12 sec)
Records: 20240  Duplicates: 0  Warnings: 0

mysql> insert into t1 (x) select x + (select count(*) from t1) from t1;
Query OK, 40480 rows affected (0.17 sec)
Records: 40480  Duplicates: 0  Warnings: 0

mysql> insert into t1 (x) select x + (select count(*) from t1) from t1;
Query OK, 80960 rows affected (0.31 sec)
Records: 80960  Duplicates: 0  Warnings: 0

mysql> insert into t1 (x) select x + (select count(*) from t1) from t1;
Query OK, 161920 rows affected (0.57 sec)
Records: 161920  Duplicates: 0  Warnings: 0

mysql> insert into t1 (x) select x + (select count(*) from t1) from t1;
Query OK, 323840 rows affected (1.13 sec)
Records: 323840  Duplicates: 0  Warnings: 0

mysql> insert into t1 (x) select x + (select count(*) from t1) from t1;
Query OK, 647680 rows affected (2.33 sec)
Records: 647680  Duplicates: 0  Warnings: 0

Solution 4:

If you want more control over the data, try something like this (in PHP):

<?php
$conn = mysql_connect(...);
$num = 100000;

$sql = 'INSERT INTO `table` (`col1`, `col2`, ...) VALUES ';
for ($i = 0; $i < $num; $i++) {
  mysql_query($sql . generate_test_values($i));
}
?>

where function generate_test_values would return a string formatted like "('val1', 'val2', ...)". If this takes a long time, you can batch them so you're not making so many db calls, e.g.:

for ($i = 0; $i < $num; $i += 10) {
  $values = array();
  for ($j = 0; $j < 10; $j++) {
    $values[] = generate_test_data($i + $j);
  }
  mysql_query($sql . join(", ", $values));
}

would only run 10000 queries, each adding 10 rows.

Solution 5:

try filldb

you can either post your schema or use existing schema and generate dummy data and export from this site and import in your data base.